"Half time/Full time" is where it is possible to bet on the result in half time as well as the final outcome of an event. For example, if at half time the score is 45-45 and the match ends 103-101, the winning outcome is Tie / Away Team (the team scoring 103). The bet is void if the regular time of the match is played in a different time format than those listed in the bet . For example, in baseball, half time is defined as the first 5 innings of a game.
When two teams square up for a matchup, whether that be on the gridiron or on the basketball court, one team is typically better than the other (for whatever reason you want to believe). Since sportsbooks are in the business of making money, they tag the better team with a point spread, thus making them the "favorites" to win that specific game. Normally, the favorite has a few favorable factors working for them like playing at home or being well rested or playing a revenge game against a team that previously beat them. Every factor counts in the world of betting, and it's up to you to decide if the "favorite' can, in fact, cover the point spread.

Let us be clear before we go any further with this strategy tip. If there is value in a bet, go ahead and make it. What we want to talk about, though, are bets where you are risking an abnormally high amount of money to win a very small amount of money. While this is still technically profitable, you might not get enough opportunities to push through the variance and realize your value.

The key here is to target the point spread five and seven, because these are virtually tied as the most common margins of victory. It's important to recognize that most betting sites are only willing to sell 2 or 3 half points for 10 cents each, after which point they start charging more. Some sites sell up to four half points at this price though.
We already mentioned how using multiple betting sites allows you to take advantage of multiple bonus offers. That's not the only benefit either. Since point spreads vary between sites, one of the best ways to beat these wagers is to compare the different spreads in order to find which one is the most favorable. This doesn't take nearly as long as you might think, and it will make a huge difference to your bottom line over time.
As you may already be assuming, adjustments are made if you want to bet on the Razorbacks. The point spread for the Razorbacks would be set at +7. It will always be the exact opposite of the other team. As the negative sign represents the favorite, the plus sign here represents the underdog. If you were to bet on the Razorbacks, they can actually still lose, and you win your bet.
The moneyline is different. First, with the moneyline whichever team wins the game pays out. There’s no giving or taking away of points. How do the bookies even the playing field with the moneyline? They do it by making bettors wager more on the favorite to win less and allowing them to bet less to win more on the dog. The favorite is posted with a minus sign and a number. That number represents the amount of cash that has to be wagered in order to win $100. The underdog, on the other hand, is listed with a plus sign in front of a number. That number shows how much a bettor wins when they bet $100.
If the team is an underdog, then the moneyline number represents exactly how much you would get paid in profit for a correct pick. So if we were to bet $100 on the Boston Celtics and won, we would get paid $145 in profit. Seems easy enough, but you may already be asking what happens if you don’t want to bet in increments of $100. This is totally fine and still straight forward to figure out.
One way to make money from sports betting is to open an account at an online betting site and take advantage of their sign up bonus. This gives you extra money to wager with, and since point spreads are so straightforward, it can be relatively easy to meet the associated wagering requirements and still come out ahead. Repeating this process at multiple betting sites will maximize your potential returns! We just ask that you please stick with reputable sites, like any of the ones that we recommend.
In most football games there is a favorite and an underdog. Very occasionally there are games where the two team are completely evenly matched, but for the most part one team is favored over the other to win. With point spreads, the idea is to create an even money proposition when betting on the game. So the favorite has to win by at least a certain number of points for a wager on them to be successful, and the underdog has to lose by no more than a certain number of points for a wager on them to be successful. The bigger the gap in quality between the two teams, the bigger the point spread.
If you are betting on a sport where there are multiple entrants, like in a race or tournament, you may find that every entrant is paying out at favorite odds. This is because it’s much more challenging to pick a winner from a large field, and the sportsbook will be rewarding you for that. Just know that when you see the plus sign, you will be getting paid better than even money for a correct pick.
Remember, these calculations are for your profit. Profit is different than the total money returned that you will get from the sportsbook. If you correctly bet the Falcons to win, the sportsbook will return you $340. This will be your $240 in profit as well as your $100 bet that you made. Make sure that you pay attention to this when working with these numbers because we see people get confused all the time as different sportsbooks will give you different numbers.
Bets on "Race to X Points / Race to X Goals..." and similar offers refer to the team/participant reaching the earliest particular tally of points. If the offer lists a timeframe (or any other period restriction) it will not include any other points tallied from other parts of the event which are not related to the mentioned time frame. Should the listed score not be reached within the stipulated time frame, all bets will be declared void, unless otherwise stated.
A quick word on that annoying half point in the point spread – most lines you’ll come across will use half points, but it’s not standard practice across the board. When you see a line with a full number instead of a number with a half point, your wager could end up as a push. In our example, if the line were 7 instead of 7.5 and the final difference in points was exactly 7, your wager is returned to you, and neither you nor the book makes money.

In most football games there is a favorite and an underdog. Very occasionally there are games where the two team are completely evenly matched, but for the most part one team is favored over the other to win. With point spreads, the idea is to create an even money proposition when betting on the game. So the favorite has to win by at least a certain number of points for a wager on them to be successful, and the underdog has to lose by no more than a certain number of points for a wager on them to be successful. The bigger the gap in quality between the two teams, the bigger the point spread.

In sports like football and basketball, the moneyline is considered as the secondary option next to point spreads. Points spreads are the way that most people get their action in on basketball betting and football betting because the payouts are near doubling your money and it’s a fun way to handicap the game. Betting the moneyline in those sports is less popular because you might have some big mismatches and then it becomes too challenging to have faith in the underdog winning outright or too costly to bet the favorite.
So the sportsbooks and bookies created a point spread to make both teams equally attractive in the eyes of bettors. Carolina was installed as a 6-point favorite, which is commonly written as Carolina -6. Denver, the underdog, is commonly written as Denver +6. In other words, Denver would be credited with whatever points they actually scored — plus six. If you bet the favorite, the Panthers would have to win by 7 points or more for you to win your wager. And remember, the Panthers are favored by 6 points, so we have to subtract 6 points from their final score for betting purposes.

This is because different bookmakers and betting sites price up games differently. So the odds they offer are not always the same. Remember the Packers versus Cardinals game we showed earlier as an example? We used the actual odds from a real betting site for that example. The following odds were also available for the same game, from various other sites.

Conversely, in most other countries financial spread betting income is considered taxable. For example, the Australian Tax Office issued a decision in March 2010 saying "Yes, the gains from financial spread betting are assessable income under section 6-5 or section 15-15 of the ITAA 1997".[6] Similarly, any losses on the spread betting contracts are deductible. This has resulted in a much lower interest in financial spread betting in those countries.
Linemakers who work for the sportsbooks must put out lines that will entice the "favorite" bettors to lay the points and take the favorite or entice the underdog bettors to take the points with the underdog. Because each sportsbook is operated under their own rules, guidelines and stipulations, they are free to put out whatever line they feel is competitive and charge whatever vig they want to based on how much action that specific line is taking.
When wagering against the spread, you bet on the team that will cover the betting line, and not necessarily win the game. Obviously by taking the favorite, a bettor believes that team will not only win the game, but also win the game by a certain number of points to cover the betting line. But when wagering on the underdog, that team does not necessarily have to win the game to cover the line. For examples of point spreads and how those bets are won, please keep reading below where we explain betting odds for the spread in detail.
Some people consider sports gambling a disease which is why it is outlawed everywhere in the United States besides Las Vegas. However, many Americans still bet on sports illegally with various overseas bookies. Because of this, many Americans believe sports gambling should be made legal throughout the United States because the country is missing out on millions of potential tax dollars by sports gamblers using overseas bookies.
Bets on “Winner of Point”, “Scorer of Goal" and similar offers refer to the participant winning the listed occurrence. For the settlement of these offers, no reference to events happening prior to the listed occurrence will be taken into consideration. Should the listed event not be won within the stipulated time frame, all bets will be declared void, unless otherwise stated.
When betting on the underdog, the first step is the same. Divide the positive moneyline by 100, which in the case of the Grizzlies in the above example would give you 2.10. Then, multiply your stake by that number to get your potential winnings. $450 multiplied by 2.10 is $945. Essentially, this means if you risked $450 on the Grizzlies, you would stand to win $945.

In an effort to have equal money on both sides of a wager, the sportsbook operator will move the point spread to attract money on the side that customers aren’t betting on. The odds for a point spread might change before the actual point spread. There are certain point spread numbers, like 3 and 7 in football, the sportsbook operators would like to avoid moving away from since they final score margin falls on these two numbers most often.